The Buttonwillow Desert Dual

[Aleru]

Great Racing out there teams!

Good Clean Racing and a battle for the podium all 8 hours, you Racers Rock!

Big Thank you to the Buttonwillow Staff and Corner Workers for helping make this race possible.

And Thank you to all the teams for making the haul out here to race at this beautiful track!

The Results can be found online at:

https://speedhive.mylaps.com/Events/1455976

Or you can download the results an LapTimes from Google at:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8YyuDP2TD64QlR5c1Q0MU1qYUU?usp=sharing

 

[KDJones2000]

Great race to watch today, with Miata PI and Pomona Speed Shop fighting for the win after Uncommon Friends broke in the last 45 minutes of the race.

 

The live stream from Pomona's car was great, at least until the last hour or so. Good thing that Aaron got his going around then as well...

 

Lots of other races going on as well, with final gap being around 30 seconds for P1/P2 until the end.

 

Great job Ben and team! Maybe at LVMS you can get your revenge PeeWee

 

 

[Aleru]

What a close Finish!

Congratulations to all the the winners this weekend!

And Thank you to all you Racers who made the haul out here to Buttonwillow to make this event possible, you all Rock!

Race Results are in!

They can be found online at:

https://speedhive.mylaps.com/Events/1455976

Or you can download Lap times and Results from Google at:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B8YyuDP2TD64QlR5c1Q0MU1qYUU?usp=sharing

 

See you at Vegas!!

[mender]

Looks like there might be another Nissan witch hunt coming up; 5 seconds a lap faster than the next fastest car is quite a gap!

[KDJones2000]

Certainly is going to be a unicorn once they figure out all of the bugs and get it to run 2 hours and not break down; kind of like Paul's DSM out here.

 

Kind of hard to have a witch hunt on one of the BOD members however

[enginerd]

1 hour ago, mender said:

Looks like there might be another Nissan witch hunt coming up; 5 seconds a lap faster than the next fastest car is quite a gap!

Looks like it might just be a really amazing driver (or amazing car and the other drivers aren't good). First guy was in the 2:02 - 2:03 range for many laps.. the next two drivers couldn't get under 2:11. Maybe the car developed issues after the first stint.

[KDJones2000]

3 minutes ago, enginerd said:

Looks like it might just be a really amazing driver (or amazing car and the other drivers aren't good). First guy was in the 2:02 - 2:03 range for many laps.. the next two drivers couldn't get under 2:11

 

Well I know that Bruce Mills often has John Morton driving for him, so he might have been the fast guy today. I think he has others from his shop who also drive that are pretty darned good racers as well.

[mender]

9 hours ago, enginerd said:

Looks like it might just be a really amazing driver (or amazing car and the other drivers aren't good). First guy was in the 2:02 - 2:03 range for many laps.. the next two drivers couldn't get under 2:11. Maybe the car developed issues after the first stint.

Or once they had two laps on the field in the first stint they decided to tame it down so they wouldn't get too many MOV laps.

 

The Datsun Z-cars are certainly noticable out on the West coast.

[mender]

9 hours ago, KDJones2000 said:

Kind of hard to have a witch hunt on one of the BOD members however

 

Great stats on the 240Z: 2301 lbs curb weight, 150 hp, 15.9 gallons and 150 VPi.

 

115 lbs/gallon at race weight with a fuel cell is exceptional and probably the best I've seen so far; enough fuel to support about 230 hp for 2 hours. At a potential 9 lbs/hp that's well below the swap power/weight threshold.

 

At 115 lbs/gallon I'd have a 22 gallon fuel cell in my Fiero. 

 

 

[Pee Wee]

10 hours ago, KDJones2000 said:

 

Well I know that Bruce Mills often has John Morton driving for him, so he might have been the fast guy today. I think he has others from his shop who also drive that are pretty darned good racers as well.

 

Troy Ermish was the fast guy. And real fast!

[Pee Wee]

12 hours ago, KDJones2000 said:

Certainly is going to be a unicorn once they figure out all of the bugs and get it to run 2 hours and not break down; kind of like Paul's DSM out here.

 

Kind of hard to have a witch hunt on one of the BOD members however

 

Trick is that you and I would just make it an average car if we drove it. You can't make a rule that doesn't allow fast drivers.

[Jamie]

Had a great time this weekend. I realized how much I like Buttonwillow Raceway, its just too bad its located in nowhere land. @Miata PI's car drove great this weekend. Ben had made some adjustments to the rear suspension and added some aero bits and it corrected the oversteer issues we were having at Seca. Unfortunately the car was crashed on Phil's Hill mid day Saturday. It spun and hit the flagger station. The driver is okay and willing admits they ran out of talent. Lucky Ben and Wilson were able to fix the car. Big thanks to  @kiwiracer for providing the new control arms and steering bits to get the car back. Lots of duct tape, machine screws, various home depot improvised parts, and sledge hammers were used but the car returned to the track Sunday morning (though we did mess up grinding because we were setting up the suspension until the last second). 

 

Had some great battles with Arsenic Racing's white Miata. Christian is a hell of a driver, I was making all kinds of mistakes trying to keep him behind me. Over the weekend I think I spent ~90 minutes side by side with him, it was so much fun. Christian had to pit for fuel one of the days (we were on different strategies) and got on our team radio to give me some pointers on my line. Thats some awesome comradely that only happens in Chump. It was also great to see Bob from Das Idiots and Christian battle it out for 3rd on Sunday. 

 

Was also lucky enough to drive @Bandit 82's 260z on Saturday. Holy poop is that car fast. We worked on some setup changes and were able to get the car to set the fastest lap of the day. Don't let the crabs fool you! The fabrication and attention to detail is amazing in that car. Its a blast to drive, the difference between it and the Miata are shockingly drastic. It was really eye opening to go from a car with Aero to one without at the same track, on the same day, in similar conditions. Thanks to @IanMoore for pushing me to do that. 

 

A bunch of us camped/parked in the same area which was really fun. I believe  @FlorahDorah has a picture of ~25-30 of us hanging out, drinking, and sharing stories. Which seems to be something that many think is missing in Chumpcar.  I don't think that would have happened without @FlorahDorah's amazing meals and impressive ability to hear cats. It was great to have Roto Plukers and Das Idiots at the track, they are the kingpin of the West Coast.

 

 @chisek, @achisek, John, and @aleru and all the track workers I am missing ran a great race. Though none of us recognized John because he lost an impressive amount of weight. You could set a watch to the start of the race, drivers meeting, parc ferme, awards, etc. We were in the race directors office couple times this weekend and thought the results were perfect and that not because we got out of a black flag its because we were explained why we deserved it and all the the calls that I was aware of were constant with the rules. Was also glad to see them recognize @bluto and No Regrats efforts over the weekend to get their MR2 there and deal with issues. With this said I was hoping that @BillStrong was at the race.

 

 

PS does anyone know why the @'s only work sometimes? This isn't a new issue. 

 

[Ian Moone]

Mine should be @IanMoone .

 

It was a great weekend of racing! My first time at BW. Hell of a track with plenty of puckerfast sections. 

Congrats to Arsenic Racing and Miata PI for the wins on Saturday and Sunday. All the other podium finishers too.

 

I am lucky enough to have to opportunity to drive the Time Bandit of which Jamie speaks. The car has way more potential then I have talent. Plain and simple and not ashamed to admit it.

Jamie got in the car and in 5 laps, after one off track at the Bus Stop,he bested the teams fast lap of the day. After some talking and tweeking he went out and in 45 minutes set fast lap of the day in a car he had only been driving for 45 minutes! One never knows the level of talent in Chump Car. We all appreciated the input and tweeking he helped us with. We had Ben run a few laps for some more input too. All he said was "awesome,that cars a beast". More input on the car ,but I can't talk about it..................................................................

      I got to go first stint on Sunday. A bit apprehensive I'll admit. Not sure what the changes made were going to do. Green flag drops and mash the gas! I thought all the changes were positive and made the car better. 10 or so laps in car started to feel a bit boggy,like it was loading up on fuel. Pitted,and boss man,chief mechanic and car builder Rod assessed we needed to change the carbs.Mission accomplished and back out in about an hour or so, Drove a bunch of laps. Learned a whole bunch. The Riverside section into Phil Hill and beyond is very fast! Hella fun too.The Esses into  Sunset are equally exciting, with speed to match. 

  Great track for going beyond what you think is possible. Although never on purpose,several off track explorations proved sufficient run off. Excellent facility. Thanks to the corner workers and track staff for a great weekend, Thanks to Mike and Andrea,and all the Chump gang for making it possible for us to live out our racing dreams.

  Side note I got slapped with a 2 minute penalty for passing under yellow. Rightly so,and my bad. So I got to have a nice conversation with John while in the penalty box. Good to have him back!

Special shout of Thanks to Uncommon Friends and Pomona Speed shop for the use of the sawzall,vice and cutoff wheel.

[Pee Wee]

Pomona Speed Shop had a great time and came out with a couple of first loser awards. Saturday I started and I just couldn't manage to overcome the wood block under the gas pedal so I dug a pretty big hole for the guys to crawl out of but they did a good job getting us up to the pointy end of the field and late attrition worked in our favor for a P2 finish.

Sunday I figured if we want a shot at winning I had better just put on my cheer leading outfit instead of a fire-suit and it almost worked out. Steve had a solid start and kept us in the hunt then cousin Rodger went out and rammed Uncommon Friends to show we meant business and somewhere along the way we managed to lead some laps. Skyler got in and things were looking to go our way and we thought perhaps it would come down to us and Friends for the win but BOOM! went the pretty Z car and one of those pesky  Japanese Miatas was ahead of our master crafted piece of German Engineered wonder machine. Somehow Miata PI managed to do thier last fuel stop and managed to get out ahead of us, I know they did the 5 minutes because I was timing it myself, rest of the tale is "keep digging I think you are catching him" not really but it felt cool to say on the radio. All in all it was a pretty cool weekend and we got beat by faster cars and drivers and my hat is of to Arsenic and PI. 

Don't know what's next either Vegas or Road America but I know I need some track time because it just kills me to get spun around as the field goes by and I just cant seem to adapt to tarmac like I can in the desert race scene.

 

Later

 

Pee Wee   

[Slugworks Paul]

The uncommon friends Z is very fast, and seems well driven. 

[KDJones2000]

1 hour ago, Pee Wee said:

...t I know I need some track time because it just kills me to get spun around as the field goes by and I just cant seem to adapt to tarmac like I can in the desert race scene...

 

May I suggest that you stop playing with that HUGE SWORD and get a road racing coach?

[Pee Wee]

10 minutes ago, KDJones2000 said:

 

May I suggest that you stop playing with that HUGE SWORD and get a road racing coach?

 

Plenty of coaching, not much learning. Teammates just say "go fast enough to scare yourself and perhaps crash"  but I just go out and have the save the car and don't go off mindset.

[FlorahDorah]

First of all, even with a small number of cars, I saw quite a bit of video of people going two- and three-wide over Phil Hill, the Sweeper, and through the Esses. @Chiefidiot has some wild in-car video of a battle between Marvin the Martian and Arsenic Racing. @Mikiel also has the battle for third place between Das Idiots and Arsenic Racing on Sunday. He was even doing the play-by-play from inside the car over the radio. We should have a RaceCast stream... but hard enough to get the car ready. 

 

Thank you @Jamie for your kind words; it's a pleasure to cook for Miata P.I., Das Idiots, and anybody else who wanders by.... Here's some pre-racing party pictures.

From left to right across the rear: Rick (Roto-Plooker), Talia (Roto-Plooker), Ben (Miata P.I.), Bill Wilwood (Wilwood Racing), Mikiel (Roto-Plooker), Christian (Arsenic Racing), Ian (Das Idiots), Cesar (Wilwood Racing), unknown Wilwood racer, friends of Miata P. I. In front: Jamie (Miata P.I.) and 'Icantrememberthisguysname'. 

 

Kaylee (Arsenic Racing), Jon (Arsenic Racing), Bob (Das Idiots), and Dave (Das Idiots). 

[Voodoo Child]

Congratulations to Arsenic Racing, Miata P.I., Pomona Speed Shop, and all the other racers at Buttonwillow.  What a great weekend of exciting finishes!

 

With regard to drivers, like many team captains, I find myself spending time finding the right mix of drivers, encouraging/discouraging certain behaviors, and making sure they are fed/rested/diapered.  I call it "herding cats".  

 

I don't want to start a string of comments-so let me apologize to everyone we pissed off, assure you I am correcting bad behaviors, and looking forward to seeing everyone at the next race (which is currently in jeopardy for us because of a blown head gasket which led to more damage).  

 

For the curious, Troy Ermish drove first (and last).  He also drives (and builds) Datsun 510's in VARA and SCCA. Check out ermish-racing.com. He builds great cars.  He is fast and aggressive and we are slowing him down and taking away his Red Bull.  Second driver Steve Nichols is a friend from England (ex Mclaren and Ferrari F1 designer).  He is a former FF2000 champion in England but shows up jet lagged so we gave back some of our gap during his stint.  John Morton (no need to tell you his resume) was our third driver. We forgot his booster seat (he is shorter than the drivers), and he couldn't disengage the clutch (and shift).  We unfortunately had to do a driver change.  Steve Ohara is a former Formula Mazda and Formula Atlantic Champion can (and did) run 2:08's in our car all day during the fourth stint. He ran down a couple of cars ahead and set up and exciting finish for Troy-but the head gasket intervened.

 

Anyway-it was exciting being able to compete with a very formidable field.  We are hoping our next car will be more reliable, easier to work on, and maybe even faster.  Thank you all for a great weekend

[Chiefidiot]

I want to thank everyone for the efforts of the past weekend (and the countless weeks leading up to it). That goes to all the ChumpCar staff @chisek and support groups that ran a great event, the corner workers and safety crews that kept the race running and of course all the teams that put the effort in to get their cars on track and have a good race. A big shout out to @FlorahDorah who, as Jamie already said, put in a big effort not only to keep all us delinquent racers fed with some great food (because we notoriously always forget food at races) but who also was a big part of getting all the teams together as seen in the pictures in her post.

As far as the racing goes, we started off pretty badly on Saturday so turned the day into a test and tune and prep day. but that didn't stop us putting down some decent times. Sunday we stuck to our plan and it turned out pretty well. At 3:09pm we were in 6th, staring at Race Monitor and going through all the permutations. We had already made our final stop for fuel and driver and were out turning decent laps for a FWD car with no tires left on a track that was getting dirtier, dustier and slipperier. We figured we had 3rd based on those times and everyone else above us needing to pit still. At 3:11 we were in 3rd with a 2 lap cushion as everyone pitted. At 3:12, with our most experienced, calm and confident driver in the car, we were sat at the blag flag station for passing under yellow (it can happen to us all) and we were out again in 3rd only 25 seconds in front of Christian of Arsenic Racing who was lapping at +2s to us. Of course, catching and overtaking are not the same and Bob can make our Jetta pretty damn wide when he wants to, but 45 mins of blocking at the end of a long hot weekend is a lot to ask and so it proved to be. Arsenic took 3rd with 1 lap to go.

We are not bitter at all. We had a great time racing and getting through the weekend with a 3 man team and thankful for the support of all our friends (especially during pit stops) including the entire team and crew of: Roto Plookers, Wilwood, Arsenic Racing and Miati P.I.

I enjoyed the battles on track with a number of the cars, except @Voodoo Child for making me cry when you walked us by almost 8s a lap and I could do nothing except get out of the way, too humbling for my competitive mind. :-) Really sorry to hear of your troubles, although I am worried about you returning with a faster car...YIKES!

 

I am trying to put some footage together to share but for now a screen shot of Arsenic Racing and Marvin going 2-wide into, around and out of On-Ramp.

[Chiefidiot]

and the few corners before....

[FlorahDorah]

13 hours ago, Voodoo Child said:

With regard to drivers, like many team captains [and pit mommas], I find myself spending time finding the right mix of drivers, encouraging/discouraging certain behaviors, and making sure they are fed/rested/diapered.  I call it "herding cats".  

 

I have NO idea what you are talking about.  

[csadn]

6 hours ago, Chiefidiot said:

I am trying to put some footage together to share but for now a screen shot of Arsenic Racing and Marvin going 2-wide into, around and out of On-Ramp.

[sarcasm] Look at all that contact -- absolute crash-fest. [/sarcasm]

[Rodger Coan-Burningham]

3 hours ago, Pee Wee said:

then cousin Rodger went out and rammed Uncommon Friends to show we meant business

 

It was my race track, what were they doing in the middle of it?  Really, like I told Bruce when I had to make the dreaded walk down the pits I have done a lot of clean racing in chump through the years with a few bonehead moves along the way but that one was tops on the bonehead list.  Luckily it didn't take them out.  Looking at video, my spin from it and the time in pits to pull the fender out was a little over a lap it cost us.  Without that, it might have been Miata PI chasing us instead of us chasing them at the end.  Shows how close this racing can be, one little mistake can be the difference.  Congrats to Ben and his team Sunday, they ran a good race, hats off working all night repairing the car from the damage the day before to go out and get the win.  It was cool to talk after the race that during that last hour we were both doing the same thing in the cars, looking where each other were at on the track to see if I was gaining any.  I didn't have any more talent and the car didn't have any more speed to close the gap.  Almost an hour of run time with the same 15 or 20 second difference, awesome stuff.

 

Our team worked well and did what we had to do to keep it close to have a shot at the end both days.  The track was a surprise, it was fun and challenging.  Would do it again given the chance.  I appreciate Perry giving me the opportunity to come out west and run with them.  Having the privilege of having run races in the east, central, and west regions has shown the racing is good, competitive, fun,  clean for the most part, and the people are great no matter what region it is in with Chumpcar.  Keep keepin it real fellow chumpers....

[Pee Wee]

On 9/12/2017 at 5:48 PM, Five Benjamin Racer said:

 

It was my race track, what were they doing in the middle of it?  Really, like I told Bruce when I had to make the dreaded walk down the pits I have done a lot of clean racing in chump through the years with a few bonehead moves along the way but that one was tops on the bonehead list.  Luckily it didn't take them out.  Looking at video, my spin from it and the time in pits to pull the fender out was a little over a lap it cost us.  Without that, it might have been Miata PI chasing us instead of us chasing them at the end.  Shows how close this racing can be, one little mistake can be the difference.  Congrats to Ben and his team Sunday, they ran a good race, hats off working all night repairing the car from the damage the day before to go out and get the win.  It was cool to talk after the race that during that last hour we were both doing the same thing in the cars, looking where each other were at on the track to see if I was gaining any.  I didn't have any more talent and the car didn't have any more speed to close the gap.  Almost an hour of run time with the same 15 or 20 second difference, awesome stuff.

 

Our team worked well and did what we had to do to keep it close to have a shot at the end both days.  The track was a surprise, it was fun and challenging.  Would do it again given the chance.  I appreciate Perry giving me the opportunity to come out west and run with them.  Having the privilege of having run races in the east, central, and west regions has shown the racing is good, competitive, fun,  clean for the most part, and the people are great no matter what region it is in with Chumpcar.  Keep keepin it real fellow chumpers....

 

Crazy that you have over 20 cars to bash around an you hit the guy who makes it so I can afford to race.